Fear

Chapter Twenty

A/N - unedited biatches

"It makes me a what?"

Harlow can't even make herself sound surprised, the obvious emotion lacking in her voice was quite plain in itself, but she couldn't even feel anything enough to shine an emotion.

Laney shifts awkwardly on two feet, her eyes darting any other way but directly at Harlow. Giving a sigh, she turns her side facing the window.

"It makes you a shifter."

Leyla snorts.

"Oh you know," she waves a flippant hand in the air, her tangled blonde hair gathering around her arm as she raises it.

"Fangs, growling, howling at the moon." Leyla puts two hands in front of her hand, cupping them forward and narrowing them until they poorly imitated fangs, she arches her back and gives a rather fake bellow at the ceiling.

"You're like the fucking wolf-man, fur sprouting hairy shit, I don't know. Maybe like Jacob and-" Leyla turns her face towards Laney, "and what's his face shiny man?"

"Edward? From the fucking preteen phenomenon movie?!" Harlow fists her hair, head tilting back in frustration.

"So that's," she gives a deep sigh, dropping her hands. "That's my life now."

Leyla hops on the counter, legs swinging wildly like a child.

"Pretty fuckin' much."

Laney rolls her eyes, pushing closer to the both of them.

"No, we're not some fucked up author's imagination," she blows her bangs back, looking for the right words.

"There's differences, like we don't turn into wolf-man." She places a hand on Harlow's twitching shoulder.

"We're not even that much different from humans." Her words try offer some comfort.

"Except for the wolf part," Leyla interjects, her voice wielding a mocking undertone.

"That," Laney glares sharply at Leyla.

"But there's also mind-set differences," she turns towards Harlow, pushing her thumb where the crossing silverish scar marred the pale skin.

"We see scars as overcomings, battle wounds." She pats Harlow's back assuringly. "Not as marks, or ugly."

Harlow's chest swells with a bitter laugh, the sound scratching her own eardrums.

"I didn't ask for this." The gasping sigh rocks out of her body in breathy words before she can stop it, instant regret paints Harlow's features.

Leyla's expression is the first to darken, her nose pulls down and her lips pull up leaving the sight of too-white teeth and an angered growl.

"Yeah? You didn't ask for this? Newsflash bitch," Leyla growls again, this time full of disgust rather than anger. "None of us did, you think any of us want to be different?" She pushes off the counter, "think any of us don't desire to someone else every-fuckin' second of the day?"

Leyla gives a shake of her head, "not one of us doesn't. So either grow up, and push your shoulders back like everyone else here," Leyla looks away sharply, as if the mere sight of Harlow rakes shivers of anger up and down her arms. "Or play the woe-is-me card, and see how quickly your dropped." She gives a little grin, one that screams predator in every sense of the word. And Harlow can't help but feel the sinking emotion of fear slip into her veins. "Survival of the fucking fittest, bitch."

And with that, Leyla stalks out of the kitchen, something moving under her night-shirt, muscles coiling in and out, like they were holding something back.